Hating The Houthis: Another FP Screwup

This is a guest post from a reader who wishes to remain anonymous. It’s a good example of how our ruling Neocon elite has gone around the world making enemies needlessly. The views expressed are the author’s. I’ve provided a few links and bit at the end.

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I was present for the events in Yemen from 2014 - 2015 involving the Houthi offensive which led, among other things, to the US abandonment of everything we had done and the friends we had made in Yemen from 2002 - 2015. 

At the time, I was telling anyone in earshot that we were making the worst foreign policy mistake in US history. Not the costliest, but the worst, in terms of ignoring all of the copious information and indicators about what we should have done, and instead doing what we did. 

At that time, the Houthis were our allies in the fight against Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). They were natural allies, in the same sense that the Kurds were/are; i.e. the Houthis hated AQAP more than we did, and AQAP reciprocated. At that time, despite stories in the media, the only two sides involved in killing each other in Yemen consisted of AQAP vs everyone else. 

The Houthis never actually "took over" the country. They arrived in Sana'a (the capital), and said, essentially, "Nothing changes, President Hadi is still president, we [Houthis] now have a stake, and we expect to get some of the proceeds from oil sales." The Houthis didn't want to be in charge of the country; they believed that they had been getting shorted on their rightful due from oil exports. 

The Houthis immediately placed all foreign ambassadors on house arrest, to prevent the closing of embassies, in order to preserve the status quo of the Hadi regime. While the Houthis were certainly not very sophisticated (especially every afternoon, once their got into their daily ration of khat), they weren't trying to take over the country.

Instead, in a comedy of errors, we evacuated our Embassy in Sana'a based solely due to panic at Foggy Bottom that Sana'a would be another Benghazi (which it would not have been, ever). We then evacuated all remaining personnel in southern Yemen due to Foggy Bottom misunderstanding US military intent, and the fact that President Obama favored DoS over DoD when it came to foreign policy decisions. Despite the actions and directives from Foggy Bottom, the US Ambassador to Yemen (Matthew Tueller) was strongly and loudly opposed to abandoning our diplomatic mission in Yemen. 

We then backed the Saudi coalition, even though people on the ground (me, and a few others) were loudly proclaiming that the Saudis could never defeat the Houthis, but they could cause a significant humanitarian crisis, and, as a result, the Houthis would come to hate the US. At the time, folks told me that the Houthis could never do anything to the US, so, in essence, who cares if we alienated the Houthis. 

Much was made of the supposed alliance due to shared belief in Shia Islam between the Houthis and the Iranians that that time, but the truth is that the Houthis are Zaydi, or “fiver” Shia, and the Iranians are “twelver” Shia, and there is a wide gulf between the two. The US and western nations, and the Gulf nations, aligned against the Houthis simply to please the Saudis, and the Iranians were the only nation that was willing to support the Houthis. The Houthis accepted Iranian support only since everyone else backed the Saudis.

The biggest winner was Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. They went from barely surviving in two governates with little presence elsewhere, to owning half the country and receiving active support from the coalition (to include the US) in a matter of several weeks.

 At that time, I was a “nobody” that happened to understand the events on the ground. Now, there is no one to say "I told you so" to, and, if there was, it wouldn't matter anyway. 

I often wish that I didn't know the things that I know.

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This map is self explanatory:

Current (November 2021) political and military control in ongoing Yemeni Civil War (2014–present) [Pink/Red] Controlled by the Government of Yemen (under the Presidential Leadership Council since April 2022) and allies [Lime Green] Controlled by Houthis-led Supreme Political Council  [White] Controlled by Al-Qaeda (AQAP) and Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant-affiliated Ansar al-Sharia [Yucky Green]  Controlled by the UAE-backed Southern Transitional Council

Queen Elizabeth II holding a sword, prepared to knight subjects in Aden as part of a 1954 visit

British Army's counter-insurgency campaign in the British-controlled territories of South Arabia, 1967